


Accidents Happen

by conceptstage



Series: Single Chapter Critical Role [26]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-22
Updated: 2019-05-22
Packaged: 2020-03-09 19:41:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18923752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/conceptstage/pseuds/conceptstage
Summary: Beau realizes she's hurting Caleb without meaning to.





	Accidents Happen

Beau sighed happily as she sunk into the heated water. The air was heavy with steam and they could hear some quiet chatting through the walls of their spa room. “I’ve been dreaming of this for weeks. Everytime I had a pool of water in my shoes, everytime I scratched dried mud off my arm, I thought about this.”

Caleb cleared his throat and nodded, sitting his two towels near the edge and sinking in across the from her. “I’m surprised no one else wanted to join.”

Beau shrugged. “Their loss. This is what paradise is.” She opened her eyes and looked over at him, halfway through a word that was barely formed in her mind, but paused. “What the fuck is that?”

He blinked at her in confusion. “Wha-What exactly are you talking about right now?”

Beau pushed herself off the bench and moved towards him through the water, grabbing his arm and turning it around in her hand. “This, these bruises. Where the fuck did these come from? They’re fresh, we haven’t had a fight in days.”

“Ah, well, that one is from yesterday, when you were laughing at Jester’s joke and hit me in the arm when you were flailing around.” He pointed to the red marks on his wrist. “This is from earlier, when you dragged me to breakfast.”

She frowned and pointed to a yellowing one on his ribs. “That?”

“I think that one is from when you hugged me. You squeezed a little too tight.”

She looked over all the bruises on his arm and chest. “I did these?” she asked.

“Many of them, yes.”

Beau took a step away from him, letting go of his arm like it had burned her, and then checking to make sure she hadn’t marked him again. “I didn’t realize… why didn’t you tell me?”

He shrugged, confusion in his eyes. “It is not a big deal. I knew you were not doing it on purpose. What am I going to do, complain about a hug just because I bruise easily?”

“Yes! When something hurts you you’re supposed to complain about it. That’s why we invented the word ‘ow’. Look, will you just tell me if I hurt you?”

He hesitated, clearly not understanding how serious she was about this, but nodded. “Ja, I can do that.” That seemed to be the end of it. She moved back to seat on the bench across from him and stared at the ceiling, seemingly no longer enjoying the bath that she has been dreaming of for weeks.

She would get over it, he decided.

He was wrong.

He first noticed the difference at the end of their bath. He reached for one of the towels that she was holding out to him but when he got close enough to take it, she dropped it to the floor.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, wrapping her own towel around her hips and marching up the stairs while she dried off her hair.

He frowned but didn’t say anything about it. 

In the war room that evening, discussing plans for the upcoming week, she stood behind him, just out of arm’s reach. He didn’t say anything about it. 

At dinner she took her plate to her room when the only seat left at the table was at his side. He didn’t say anything.

He didn’t realize how often she touched him throughout the day until she didn’t anymore. There was no friendly hand on his shoulder to get his attention when he was reading long into the night, no insistant hand on his elbow to pull him over to his bedroom door, no one pushing his back and saying ‘Sleep, you dumbass’. Instead, he was interrupted from his reading only by the feeling of overwhelming tiredness in his eyes hours after he should have gone to sleep. He shuffled down the hall on his own, his arms hanging heavy at his sides. He stepped into the dining room and nearly crashed into someone who was stepping out.

“Oh,” Beau said, quickly shoving her hands into her pockets. “Morning.”

Yesterday morning she had given him a friendly smack on the back when they’d run into each other in the hall. “Can I talk to you?” he asked before he even realized that his mouth was moving. 

She hesitated but nodded. “Sure.”

He stared at her for a moment and she pointedly avoided his eyes. “You think that you have to be careful around me so that you do not hurt me accidentally anymore,” he said after a few moments. She nodded, her shoulders tense. He reached up quickly and started pinching hard down his arm. 

She reached out without thinking and grabbed his wrist. “What the fuck are you doing!”

“Look, I bruise like a peach,” he pulled up his sleeve and showed her three brand new, darkening bruises down the line of his arm. “I bruise when I sit down too fast. I bruise when I hit my elbow on door frames. I wake up with bruises and I have no idea what caused them. If the choice is between having bruises and never hugging anyone again, I will choose the bruises.”

She still seemed unsure. “What if I accidentally hurt you worse? What if I break something?”

“You won’t. I trust you.”

“If I ever went too far…”

“I would tell you.”

She seemed to be trying to smother a smile but then snorted and shook her head, the smile forcing its way out anyway. “You fucker,” she said, moving passed him back towards the door. She paused and gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder. “Get some fucking sleep, you nerd.” Then she left him alone in the room.

He waited until she was gone to wince and rub the brand new ache on his shoulder.


End file.
